


The End is Silent

by MargotSails



Category: Original Work
Genre: Flash Fic, Gen, Sad, Short Story, Western
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:26:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26310025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MargotSails/pseuds/MargotSails
Summary: The life of Jebson McCurdy.
Kudos: 1





	The End is Silent

Jebson McCurdy’s whole life has been filled with noise. He was born on the floor of a whorehouse. In the saloon, in the middle of a fight. His mother was a whore and hadn’t even known she was pregnant. She didn’t survive. The owner of the establishment had taken pity on him. Doing the bare minimum to keep him alive until he was old enough to earn his keep. He was given a meal a day and a corner to sleep in.

The whorehouse was alive with constant noises. From the shouts of drunks downstairs in the saloon. To the bedrooms upstairs that had their own noises. At the age of ten, he woke up to screams and gunfire. He watched as the only people he had known his whole life were slaughtered in front of him. The screams of terror still fill his head at night.

The masked attackers had spared his life and tossed him on the back of a horse. They lived in the middle of the desert. A barely standing building their shelter. They were loud and cruel. They made him do things for them. Cook and clean. Things only a woman should do for a man. They made him wash them even though their stench never went away. 

They beat him if he wasn’t fast enough or good enough. They dragged him along as they attacked poor farmers in their own homes. As they ransacked poor towns and took everything they had. He listened to the delighted shouts throughout the night. They bragged about the rapes and the murders.

And he served them. He ate scraps off the plates he cleaned. He spent days on horseback. The constant sound of thundering hoofs as they looked for more victims. He sought solace at night, but there was still the shouts of drunken men and scared women. He could hear them even in sleep.

It was only by happenstance that he knew he was fifteen years old. He had caught a bit of conversation about the year. He was nearly a man. But he still felt like a boy. He felt like a child when they berated him and when they beat him. 

It happens at night again. Another group of masked men finds their dilapidated hideout in the desert. This time he is not spared. The ground beneath him is cold. The night dark. But there is silence. The men are silent for the first time since he was taken from the whorehouse. All had taken their last breath. 

The desert night is usually filled with the wind but even it is silent. He doesn’t hurt anymore. He can see the stars. One of the women at the whorehouse had told him once, that the brightest stars were loved ones looking down at us. But he’s never been loved. He hopes that maybe someone is looking down on him. Feeling sorry for his pathetic life. 

For a life that was filled with noise. The end of Jebson McCurdy is silent.


End file.
